No Calluses on Your Knees

Pentecost 19, Proper 21B

James 5:13-20

St. Matthias

September 30, 2018

Correction.  There is an error in the audio recording.  I make reference to a shorter version of the Lord's Prayer found in the Gospel of Mark.  I meant to say the Gospel of Luke.  It is correct in the text below, I just messed it up while preaching.  My apologies to St. Mark, St. Luke, and to you!

          The next time you are in Russia – go South and in between the Black and Caspian Seas – you will find the country of GEORGIA.  In Central Georgia, there is a place called the Valley of the Monks and the Katskhi Pillar – a limestone column rising over 130 feet in the air.  And on top of the Katskhi Pillar lives a monk – Father Maxim.  He lives there alone because there is only enough room for 1 person.  Father Maxim in a Stylite monk – a rather unusual tradition of hermits.  The first, Saint Simeon, lived on a small platform on top of this same Katskhi Pillar for 37 years in the 6^th Century.   The Stylites devote their lives to prayer - coming down from their pillars only to go to Church and to talk with pilgrims seeking spiritual guidance.

           At Wolverhampton in the United Kingdom, there is a community of Carmelite nuns who live in silence. They speak only to one another when absolutely required or with the permission of the Mother Superior.  They leave the Abbey only to go to the hospital and to vote.  The whole of their lives is devoted to prayer.  Recently they allowed a single person to come in and video their life as Carmelite Nuns.  Sister Angela, the oldest nun in the order, was asked why people don’t follow God and I loved her answer.  She said it is because they do not pray because they do not know how.  They talk and talk and talk, but never stop to listen to what God has to say.  So, if they never listen, how would they know where to follow God.

           James tells the Christians in Jerusalem to pray at all times.  He says that prayer is POWERFUL and EFFECTIVE.  This is most likely James, the brother of Jesus, and it is said that James prayed so often and for so long that he literally had callouses on his knees.  James tells anyone reading his Epistle that when we are suffering, we should pray.  When we are sick or seeking forgiveness, we should pray.  When we are cheerful we should sing songs of praise and Phyllis reminded me the other day that it was St. Augustine who said, “He who sings, prays twice.” 

           Jesus certainly prayed.  The scriptures tell us that Jesus often went into the mountains or beside the Sea of Galilee to pray.  He prayed for those he healed.  He prayed before walking on water.  He took 5 loaves and 2 fish – prayed - and fed 5,000. Jesus prayed from the cross.  Jesus prays before any major decision or any major event in His ministry.  Interestingly enough the only place in the Gospels where Jesus doesn’t seem to pray is in the Synagogue.  My how things have changed.

           There is a lot of talk today ABOUT prayer, but of all the things Christians seem to have the most trouble with – it is prayer.  I love the look of relief when I walk into any gathering where prayer is expected.  I immediately become the most popular person in the room.  Walk into any bookstore with a religion section and books on prayer take up the most shelf space.  We want prayer in schools, prayer at football games and prayer before the city council meeting.  But who will pray and what will they say?  Why do we have so much trouble praying?

           Every Sunday we offer the prayer that Jesus taught the disciples in the Gospel of Matthew.  We call it the Lord’s Prayer, but it really should the Disciples’ Prayer because it was for them.  Notice how short it is – there is an even shorter version in the Gospel of Luke.  All of the prayers that Jesus prayed that are recorded in the Gospels are brief.  “Father forgive them for they know not what they do.”  Even the prayers in the Upper Room at the Last Supper were short.  Why?  Because prayer is more about listening to God than talking AT God.  Growing up in the Southern Baptist Church, you always knew that the last thing that happened before the service was over was that one of the Deacons in the Church would pray.  Those prayers could last a long time.  I remember when it was my Dad’s turn to pray, my mother would tell him to keep it short, so the roast wouldn’t burn.  My father loved a good roast.

           Prayer is really about listening to God.  I hear God most clearly at Camp McDowell.  I can walk in the woods, paddle down Clear Creek, or rock on a porch.  I think I hear God most clearly when I’m listening in a rocking chair.  We need to remember that Prayer is about us and our relationship with God.  Yes, we pray for others and that is important.  Yes, we pray for peace and our country and the world and that is important too.  But most importantly we are to pray that we will know God’s presence more and more clearly, that we will love Him more dearly, and follow him more nearly.  There is only one place in the Lord’s Prayer where we pray for others – and even then it’s when we ask that God will help us forgive others as we have been forgiven.  When it comes right down to it and if I am honest with myself, we have the hardest time praying for ourselves.  The Good News is that God hears our deepest sighs and knows our needs before we even ask.

           Now the good news is that you don’t need to rub callouses on your knees – you can pray in your favorite chair – even from your favorite rocking chair.  You don’t have to climb a pillar or join a monastery, you can pray anywhere.  Start a list of people to pray for and put yourself at the very top of the list.  Sit and listen.  Talk less.  Believe more.  And on a really good day, give thanks in song.  The best thing about prayer is that we all sound good – even when we sing.  AMEN.